At a time when primary turnout is already taking a hit from the coronavirus, a new photo ID requirement in Kentucky looms as another deterrent from the polls this year.

Legislation cleared Thursday by the General Assembly would require would-be voters show a driver's license or other government-issued identification with a photo. Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear has signaled he opposes the bill, but his veto would have minimal effect because the House and Senate are solidly Republican and have the power to override him by simple majority.

The bill was already viewed as adding Kentucky to the roster of states with the toughest voter ID requirements. Critics now lament the measure could suppress the vote further because of the public health emergency, which has closed or curtailed office hours at many of the government offices that issue ID cards.

<p>Text of the measure, finalized in negotiations just as lawmakers prepared to leave Frankfurt until early April to minimize their Covid-19 exposure, is not yet available to the public. So it's unclear if the photo ID requirement will take effect for the primaries now set for June 23, a month's delay because of the pandemic. Congressional, state legislative, judicial and big city contests are on the ballot along with the two remaining in the Democratic presidential contest.</p><p>Kentuckians are now asked to show identification, no photo required, before casting a ballot. Thirty-five states will have some form of voter ID law in effect for November. If Kentucky's law is changed, it would be the eighth state with a similarly strict photo ID law.</p><p>Republicans generally praise voter ID laws as a way to safeguard elections from fraud, although there have been no such incidents reported in Kentucky in recent years. Democrats and voting rights advocates say the consequence of strict ID rules is the disenfranchisement of people who are poor, have disabilities, are elderly or come from minority groups. </p><p>Before deciding to postpone the end of their annual session, and limit it to the annual budget, lawmakers this week advanced but then abandoned legislation that would require counties to replace their old voting machines with more secure ones. The bill would not have provided any state money to pay for it, though. Kentucky is one of only eight states in the country that still has some voting machines that don't create a paper trail, which is the new standard for conducting the most reliable elections.</p><p>While Kentucky will soon receive $6.4 million in federal funds to address election security, it won't be enough to cover a statewide equipment update. State election officials estimate replacing voting machines in all 120 counties will cost $80 million.</p>

Some 378,000 transgender voters could be blocked from casting ballots this fall because their names, appearances or gender identities don't match their driver's licenses or other identification, a California think tank estimates.

The figure is about one-quarter of 1 percent of the national electorate, a relatively tiny share that could nonetheless be dispositive in an extremely close presidential election — especially if trans voters get turned away in battleground states. Wisconsin, Arizona, Ohio and Georgia, for example, have some of the most restrictive laws among the 35 states requiring voters to show ID at their polling places.

"Especially in states that require an ID to be shown, this could result in some transgender voters being disenfranchised," said Jody Herman, a researcher who compiled the report released Thursday by the Williams Institute at the UCLA School of Law.

<p>Backers of strict voter ID laws say they're needed to ward off voting fraud. Voting rights advocates say that threat is beyond minimal and that the bigger danger is the effort by GOP lawmakers to disenfranchise Democrats — particularly poor and minority voters who don't drive, don't have jobs with ID cards and move frequently.</p><p>The new study says that transgender people should be part of that concern.</p><p>Four years ago, 5 percent of the 136.7 million voters identified as gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender — and only 14 percent told exit pollsters they'd voted for Donald Trump. So turning away trans people would disproportionately hurt Democratic turnout.</p><p>Georgia, which has two competitive Senate races this year and where Democrats hope to contest the 15 electoral votes for the first time in three decades, has an "exact match" law requiring personal information on voter applications (such as names) to precisely agree with state databases. A very similar law is on the books in Wisconsin, which Trump carried by less than a percentage point in 2016 to break a seven-election winning streak for the Democrats.</p><p> "Transgender people should not be denied their opportunity to participate in our democracy because laws and regulations around identification documents haven't kept up with reality," said Mara Keisling of the National Center for Transgender Equality Action Fund.</p>

Virginia state lawmakers on Tuesday approved a package of bills to make it easier to register and vote in a state that will likely play a crucial role in deciding the outcome of November's election.

The legislation changes Election Day to a state holiday, allows for "no-excuse" absentee voting, establishes automatic voter registration and repeals a requirement that voters show photo identification at the polls. This would make Virginia the first state to repeal such a law.

<p>Passing legislation to make it easier to vote fulfills the legislative promises of Democratic lawmakers who won control of the General Assembly last year and now control both the statehouse and governor's mansion for the first time since 1993.</p>
<p>The four bills are expected to be signed by Democratic Gov. Ralph Northam, who has expressed support for legislation aimed at expanding access to the ballot box. </p>
<p>"We are one step closer to a more representative and inclusive Virginia," Northam said Tuesday in a statement.</p>
<p>Virginia was a reliably Republican state in presidential elections from 1952-2004 (with the exception of the Lyndon Johnson landslide in 1964). Democrats have won the last three elections, with Hillary Clinton edging Donald Trump by about 6 percentage points in 2016.</p>
<p>One elections-related bill that failed to advance Tuesday was a proposal for Virginia to join 16 other states that have signed on to the National Popular Vote Compact, an agreement whereby a participating state agrees to award its electoral votes to the winner of the nationwide popular vote. The compact goes in effect only after states that hold a majority of electoral votes have joined. </p>
<p>The proposal passed the state House two weeks ago but failed to advance Tuesday out of a Senate committee, which voted to reconsider the idea in 2021.</p>
<p><a href="https://thefulcrum.us/national-popular-vote-2638979693" target="_self">National Popular Vote</a>, the advocacy group leading the popular vote movement, expressed disappointment but added a hint of optimism about the bill's chances next year.</p>
<p>"This wasn't the result we wanted but not terrible either," NPV <a href="https://twitter.com/NatlPopularVote/status/1232453726436118528" target="_blank">tweeted</a> following the vote. "The VA Senate committee vote postponed action until next January when we will get another chance to send the bill to the governor."</p>
<p>By January 2021, Virginia and other states that have joined or will be considering joining the compact will likely know whether the agreement is a legally viable way of sidestepping the Electoral College's grip on presidential elections. The 16 states that have passed the compact represent 196 electoral votes, or 74 votes short of the 270 needed to enact the interstate compact. </p>
<p>On April 28, the Supreme Court is expected to hear arguments in <a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/search.aspx?filename=/docket/DocketFiles/html/Public/19-465.html" target="_blank">Chiafalo v. State of Washington</a>, a case to resolve the question of whether states can legally bind their presidential electors to vote for a particular candidate. Should the court decide that electors are free to cast a vote for whomever they choose, the ruling would essentially undermine the legitimacy of the compact since states would have no authority to enforce it. </p>